I think I'm a part of the first generation of journalists to skip print media entirely, and I've learned a lot these last few years at Forbes. My work has appeared on TVOvermind, IGN, and most importantly, a segment on The Colbert Report at one point. Feel free to follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, write me on Facebook or just email at paultassi(at)gmail(dot)com. I'm also almost finished with my sci-fi novel series, The Earthborn Trilogy.

Gaming Journalism's Problem Isn't Being 'Beholden' to Companies

I think remembering what it’s like to be a player, not just a critic, is a niche that we’ve found here at Forbes, and we have the additional responsibility to try to provide analysis that ties issues back to what it means for the company’s bottom line. If a unclear ending of a game makes it looks like a company is setting itself up for future DLC, that’s what I’ll say. If I believe a company should alter said ending for free to win back the invaluable goodwill of consumers, it’s not a stretch to publish such a thought.

Don't even get me started.

But to say that because others don’t feel the same way, that makes them biased or paid-off, I don’t think that’s fair. I owe nothing to the other writers and editors from these larger sites. I personally don’t know them and I’m not a part of their “club.” But I don’t think we need to trash an entire industry based on a few rogue instances of malfeasance.

Fans, respect that sometimes journalists will have different opinions than you, and this does not make them paid stooges for gaming companies. Journalists, respect your fans’ contrasting opinions and try to learn why they feel the way they do, rather than mock them for their views.

I’m glad for all the new readers the Forbes gaming section has gotten over the past few weeks because of our coverage of this controversy. I assure you that we believe everything we are writing, and are not pandering to the majority in order to get clicks. I’ve got over a hundred hours of Mass Effect gameplay across three games that proves these issues matter to me. And I have a responsibility to call out companies that are exhibiting behaviors that I believe will hurt them financially in the long run. I’m happy we seem to be on the same page, and I hope you’ll stick around even after we stop talking about Mass Effect.

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Yeah, this is my impression most of the time. The different sites might inflate the numerical value at the end of the review, but what they put in the text usually reflects the pros and cons of the game well enough. Many sites didn’t even single out the ending because no emotional attachment to the story and rushing to meet the deadline meant they just shrugged it off as “kinda weird” and moved on. But IGN really does deserve singling out, both for being uniquely aggresive towards the customer base and for getting so involved into an argument about a game where one of their own stars. You can only say they’re independent press for so long. Where Jessica Chobot of IGN fame is also Jessica Chobot from Mass Effect 3, it’s hard not to put 2 and 2 together.

I didn’t even know about the connection, but I was really excited about the idea of a reporter tagging along on the ship. From a storytelling standpoint, it seemed like it could have led to some really clever story points about how others are viewing the war and the Normandy’s quest. Instead, we got a vapid, horribly-acted, grating character that should make BioWare rethink the option to carry your gun around inside the Normandy.

I used my friend’s Xbox 360 a few days ago and when I checked out some of the videos for IGN’s Insider Tips for ME3, i have to say, I felt a little ticked off by it. Now as a person, I’ve never had an issue with Jessica Chobot, never had a bad thing to say. Under normal circumstances I used to watch her videos because I wanted to hear about the games, what I might have missed in a playthrough, things like that.

Now when I watched the ME3 video and listened to Jessica name drop her character in the game, I felt a little bit of vomit well up in the back of my throat. What happened to impartial journalism?? for the whole segment while she was talking about ME3, she would regularly interject that “THIS IS SPOILER FREE!”. Each time she said that, it felt like a spit in the eye from IGN at all of those people that had such valid criticisms with the endings. Heck, maybe it was my imagination, but the fact that she was the one doing the ME3 videos felt like a pretty cheap shot.

Thank you so much for this. If people’s attitudes towards the entire industry are so cynical, they should really just walk away from it. Even last night, after the press statement, people all over BioWare’s forum are up in arms about how guarded and particularly-worded the statement was. As much as people don’t want to admit it, game publishers and developers are businesses. Though we like to think of them as endlessly slaving away towards a creative juggernaut, the fact is that they HAVE TO answer to a bottom line and corporate oversight. I actually think it’s fantastic that BioWare has been able to consistently deliver such great games under EA; proves that EA has faith in them, and since they are the ones paying for the game to get out there, that’s gotta count for something.

I also meant to mention: You make a great point about veteran gaming journalists. People tend to forget that, especially for younger people, your compaints might not hold true to someone not so entrenched in the business. I’ve seen TV reviewers complain about a rehashed storyline on a sitcom, but if the sitcom you’re talking about is, say, The Cosby Show or Cheers, there are a LOT of viewers who have no idea that is the case. And if you’ve never seen it done before, maybe it works just fine for you. Even now, when I see a show use a joke done on Seinfeld or Friends (I was a teen during both of their runs), I may grumble for a moment, but I also realize that many of the people watching that show may not have ever seen those shows. I think you’re right, it would help many journalists to step back, take a breath, and get perspective on who they’re talking to.

The pulishers use access to pre-release material to keep the mainstream gaming websites on message. Those sites main source of revenue is advertising the product they are reviewing. They gain readers by getting access to the review code early. No one would go to the site if the reviews were two weeks after the release

Can a system like that be unbiased. It’s not being cynical to see that relationship as being a little unhealthy.

Mass Effect 3 really is showing a huge disconnect with professional game critics and general gamers. Just look at metacritic which has the average score of multiple critics but also that of regular users. The critics average for the game is 90/100 or 9/10 and regular users give it a 3.7/10 and not one critic has rated this less then 7. That’s a huge difference, usually user and critic scores are about the same so what is happening with this one?

I don’t know exactly what is up, but something is definitely suspicious about it. Being in the publishers pocket isn’t completely outside of the realm of possibility. I remember when Microsoft sent a bunch of people brand new laptops with windows vista installed so they could review it, and of course they got to keep the laptops, this when people hated vista.

How could every game critic have lost touch with their passion for the games they are reviewing. Given the sheer number of people who are talking negatively about this game i’d expect to see more negative reviews for it, but I don’t. It is just totally bizarre. The people who are saying bad things about this game aren’t all unintelligent either, as alot of critics like to say. They have nailed to the wall why this game deserves the rejection it’s getting from fans. But then why do most game critics show such unity in praising the game and they don’t even suggest the ending could have been better, to them the game is nearly perfect. So much so they write articles scoffing at the suggestion the ending could have been improved.

I can’t put this down to a difference of opinion or I would expect to see more negative reviews which support the fans who are upset. I know there’s some players who loved the game and would agree with all the positive reviews. So where is the other side from the critics? There’s got to be more too it.

See, but this is what I mean. Here, I think the fans are at fault and acting juvenile for bombing the Metacritic scores. Does Mass Effect 3 deserve a 3.7? Really? Come on now. I know the industry has its problems with the 7 to 10 only scale, but it’s not unreasonable to give Mass Effect 3 a good review, despite the ending. I certainly would.

That point was brought up in the article: can you really give a game a bad review when the game is fantastic, but the ending really lacks? If you can, good for you, and you have that right. Personally, I’d like to know what the user reviews were before a majority of players beat the game. Sorry, but for some of us, a bad ending can’t retroactively ruin an entire game that we had a blast playing. I get it if it can for you and others, but it’s not beyond possiblility that many of the reviewers, even ones who absolutely hated the ending, agree that the game still deserves a 9 or 9.5.

I have to disagree. There is no disconnect between the critics and “general” gamers. To make the assumption that folks in gaming websites/magazines aren’t general gamers doesn’t support what this article is about.

The reason why the Metacritic score for Users is so low is because fans were giving Mass Effect 3 scores of 0 even before the game came out. The Metacritic scoring system (when it comes to the users) is screwed up due to the fact that people were pissed off about the ending, EA, Bioware, etc..

Metacritic works because it gives a voice to the people but the problem is is that it also gives a voice to the people (does that make sense?). I mean that anyone with a vendetta can create an account and lower the score of a game just because they thought that the box cover should be green.

It happens a lot. Critics love a movie/game and the fans hate it/ don’t go see it. Fans love a movie/game and it makes a crap load of money and the critics pan it. Critics are just that: critics. Yes, some sites *IGN* seem really entrenched in the whole gaming/money/marketing/Chobit/ME3 thing but that doesn’t mean that all sites are like them.

To summarize, just because the critics love it and you hate it doesn’t mean they are wrong. Some people LOVE this game and that’s why you have people who have voted it a 10 on metacritic. It comes down to difference of opinion.

No it doesn’t deserve 3.7, and yes it probably is a bunch of people going on there to give it 0 to outlet their frustration. I was just using it as an example to show the difference between fans and critics. I just think fans could use some more critical support. But they aren’t getting it from just about everyone.

I think the metacritic “score bombing” is a reaction to get the attention of others. Not to long ago MW3 went through the same thing, because fans were tired of the same thing in a new package. The same applies to ME3, but for a different reason. I agree, that ME3 doesn’t deserve a 3.7 overall, but its a way for the fans to get the attention of the developers to let them know how they fell and that they are serious.

It likely doesn’t deserve a 3.7, but that argument goes both ways, Dr. Ray Muzyka was defending it by saying it got 75 perfect scores, does that sound reasonable if there are obvious issues with a title? If a huge number of consumers feel as burned by things like “Day-1 DLC”, Origin-only DRM and probably the largest amount of cross-promotion DLC of any product to date and similar (which is likely where the review-bombing stems from), doesn’t that deserve some sort of mention in such a Review? http://www.kotaku.com.au/2012/02/buying-all-of-mass-effect-3s-dlc-will-cost-you-870/ And how comes there’s no conflict of interest if a staff-writer of IGN and host of G4 is part of the games, yet these publications still review the game very favorably?

But by messing up the score and saying “This is a piece of garbage because I don’t like gay scenes” doesn’t really help any cause and just messes up anything anyone else has to say. (No joke, I saw an example like that).

you might be missing a key point Paul: what gamers rate the game isnt important, that they have a radically different rating to reviewers is. If a reviewer is truly representative of a game then why werent 90% of reviewers, at the very least, making statements pre-controversy over how the ending might be dissapointing? The actual scores dont matter, the disconnect does.

I think a key difference is many reviewers obviously feel a professional responsibility to be objective and base a review more on gameplay, mechanics, entertainment and amount of content you get for the investment. Those reviewers are probably able to divorce the let down of the last minutes in light of the 29 hrs that got them there as you said Paul.

Gamers without that professional responsibility are incensed because ME3 was such a great game and series that most became emotionally tethered. There is no greater enemy than someone who was a best friend or family member.

I think a key difference is gamers based their rating off the whole series and the emotional let down of the ending, reviewers based their ratings off this one game and some may have only seen the ending after.

The uproar is a documented testimony to the greatness of the series and the magic that BioWare artistically crafted. Perhaps some might mock the emotion that gamers developed for ME but if there were no responsibility to review a game objectively i have no doubt many reviewers would have joined the verbal uproar of the gaming community.

Also, let’s be honest, as much as I count myself part of the gaming community, we are not a patient, forgiving and softspoken group. But BioWare has created some amazing games, and I think it would be a crime and a shame for gamers to estrange their brand based on this ending.

I feel that many fans “bombed” metacritic because they don’t know how else to send a strong message of their dislike for the ending, other than not buying a future game from Bioware. But the effects of a mass of fans (yeah, i just did that) not buying a future game won’t be felt until sometime in, well, the future. So they “bomb” their dislike to get the message across. I’m not condoning it, just explaining how I see it. Being “lukewarm” on a review (i.e. 7.0, 3 off for terrible ending) typically doesn’t send a strong message to the company as they will rationalize to themselves how great their game is and how the fans didn’t “get it.”

I agree that it doesn’t deserve a 3.7 as an individual game. The user ratings are not simply a reflection of the game itself but also how it serves the purpose of concluding the series. In that sense, it has failed horribly and a 3.7 could be argued as justified.

I had plans of starting again at ME1 multiple times. After experiencing the ending, the idea of playing any mass effect game with the current ending is soured.

In all fairness, do you think people would be driving those scores down if they believed outlets like IGN and G4, who wield an ENORMOUS amount of power over the opinion and spending habits of their considerable audiences, could be trusted to address their concerns in a way that is open and honest? Because they haven’t done that. Not only have they not given critics of the game a fair shake, they’ve more or less shoved them under the rug where they haven’t outright dismissed or attacked them as being entitled or unintelligence.

Isn’t it possible that they’re going through the only unfiltered channels that are available to them? I can e-mail as many sites as I want asking them to address or at least state my concerns and inject them into the discussion, but what are the chances that they’ll listen? Moreover, what’s the chance that they’ll characterize my thoughts as I intended them and give them the weight that they deserve?

To be clear, I didn’t participate in those activities. While I don’t think the people that did are juvenile for doing so, I just didn’t feel right about it and wasn’t sure how that could be rectified if BioWare were to make good and fix what they broke. That said, I don’t think the people who did it were juvenile. Short-sighted, perhaps, but they were flexing the only muscle they had.

Yes, Mass Effect deserves a 3.7 if that is what the consumer feels it deserves.

We rate the game as a whole, not the first 90%. The ending really is that bad and the ratings reflect it. It is based on the principle of broken promises by EA regarding the ending and what is obviously a rushed ending, complete with video sequences that don’t even make sense, such as the Normandy in warp transit for no explicable reason.

To simply say fans are “at fault and acting juvenile for bombing the Metacritic scores” completely insults and marginalizes the consumer. Such a statement commits the fallacy of labeling the upset consumers “cry babies” and completely misses the issue while alienating your own readers.

Either way, consumers are voting with their wallets. I just canceled my SWTOR account over the ME3 ending, based on principle alone.

This flashed to the middle of my screen when I finished my first post. And had a sudden thought.

I do agree with your sentiments on that issue; why ‘bomb’ a score based on the ending?

My thought was, maybe this is the only way people think/thought that they could bring attention to the situation? Let’s face it, I’ve been READING a lot and if weren’t for you guys at Forbes, I’d venture to say, ‘there would be no other side.’

The end was the only downfall of the entire game, indoctrination theory or no. The first 90% of the game was the best I’ve played in the past few years, while the end was bittersweet for me. I can’t say I hate the idea of new DLCs, but to jip an ending just to sell extras would push me out of Bioware’s corner. Nowhere near 3.7 though.

Yes, it does. It’s not unreasonable to give Mass Effect 3 a terrible review with how it ends, because the ending utterly taints the several hundred hours that have come before. When I have to say “I don’t think you should play this game at all right now, certainly not through to the finish, and if you do I am sorry” to friends, yes, the game deserves a bad review.

And quite frankly IGN’s little cursing session towards fans that want a new ending to ME3 does NOTHING to dissuade the opinion of some that review companies are in the industry’s back pocket. It’s not a hard pill to swallow, either – the Kane and Lynch debacle totally tainted the reviewer industry, and quite frankly I haven’t seen any improvements that keep me from looking at all of the major players with a serious grain of salt.

My feeling is not that games site reviewers are “owned” by game publishers. That said I can’t help but feel a subtle bias (and I’ll admit I’m biased as a long term ME3 fan) towards the industry because of the dependence on ad revenue and access. It’s nagging issues like some reviewers using “straw man” arguments to dismiss the complaints of ME consumers that bug me.

This is actually pretty common in other areas of journalism. Look at politics when you see journalist that travel around with candidates and how they handle politicians with kid gloves when given “exclusive access.”

Some good words to hear, Paul. I’ll even admit it’s easy to fall into conspiracy theories of the gaming press being in the publishers’ pockets, but as you stated, it probably isn’t true. Not to that kind of extent, anyway. Kudos also for keeping a balanced perspective and not blasting either side unnecessarily, especially when the opportunity was there (I’d imagine) to side completely with disgruntled fans and blast away at Bioware/EA/big business while fans (myself included) cheered with approval.

But I’ll say, whatever the reason, some of the op-ed pieces and articles that came out attacking the fans were just so senseless…it’s like, why are you saying these things? Especially as the gaming industry is trying to show other entertainment industries how “grown up” we are?

The issue with other people being beholden to the industry is not just in the tech sector. People who give favorable reviews get earlier access to information and reviewable material. This is systemic to the whole tech industry, Apple being one of the biggest offenders.

Forbes looked at the issue from the only logical angle. The money. They followed the money, stated that it originated with customer’s, stated why that was a good thing and why keeping customer’s happy was the way businesses should work, and that was that. Other gaming rags ignore this out of hand. They minimize our number 1 gripe like its nothing. This really does convince me that they are siding with the industry out right, which seems like the wrong answer to a false question. Wouldn’t every one be better served by making the customer’s happy? Why is this not part of their writing?

This article does a better job than I could explaining why the ME3 reviews were disheartening. If game reviewers want to be taken more seriously, they need to actually criticize faults. The fact that the majority of the reviews either ignored the atrocious ending or worse, praised it for inane reasons, really puts a black eye on video game journalism.

It’s not just a perception by a few people, for instance there was a very interesting Interview regarding these issues recently with the CEO of Larian Studios over at Neoseeker, it is called : Games Journalism is Broken and was a good read, it describes a kind of reality as seen from a studio head no less and shared by many gamers.

There is also a ~10 minute long YouTube video describing the issues perceived by many somewhat, which goes back over some of the “incidents” in context of Mass Effect 3 and before. It’s also where I stumbled upon this Editorial by the Editor-in-Chief of 1Up back in the day complaining about the state of the industry, although it is somewhat old it also makes specific claims.

I think it’s important that we do not downplay the business ties between any media’s sponsorship and their stated opinions.

The IGN reporter included as a body/character model and voice actor in the game is damning, when followed by ardent and fallacious support by other employees of IGN. The financial support ME2 provided to Penny Arcade’s Child’s Play Charity also demands that I critically re-consider the journalistic integrity of any Penny Arcade review that supports ME3, or even worse, lampoons the people who protest it.

Let us not lose sight of the core problem: This entire controversy, is over a lack of honesty from the PR of BioWare. The leaders of that PR department made clear, concise promises to their fans about their product, which were clearly not delivered on launch day. It is a legitimate concern to question the honesty of the media’s reaction when those media representatives themselves also have questionable priorities incorporated in their finances.

Money is power. Journalistic integrity is worth questioning, when you see money, gifts, and favors given from a corporation to any member of the media. This is not much different than questionable campaign contributions in political elections.

It is no surprise to me, that an issue that revolves around broken trust from a PR standpoint, would then balloon out to include a scrutiny of the media’s integrity. It is BioWare’s integrity that is at question, and yes, it is the media’s integrity, as the tool which was used by BioWare PR to continue hyping their false promises, that should also be scrutinized.

I’d like to see a clearer division between finances and media, myself. I think the whole system of paid advertising to sponsor journalism is something worth re-evaluation. Perhaps it’s time for a new business model?

From personal experience in games reviewing for physical media magazines reviewers are constantly under intense pressure from developers and distributors to provide good reviews.

The real disconnect however happened many years ago at the dawn of the internet and soon after where the quality of a review became far less important than when the review came out: getting the first ‘review’ out became the most important element of a review.

On many, many occasions “reviews” were completed long before a game was finished, often on preview code not fully representative of the final game and so on and so forth.

I see nothing that has changed now and I do not foresee this furore making any significant difference to the current paucity of ‘proper’ reviewers i.e. those willing to invest the required time to review the end product from a position of first-hand knowledge. (…not those persuaded to produce “great” reviews after 6 rounds of beer and a load of freebies after playing 45 minutes on pre-release code).

Whilst that is not typical of the majority of reviewers it is, certainly, not a tiny minority.

Anybody familiar with the ME ‘verse, who got to the end of ME3 and did not think “You know, this failed to do what it said they would do” should be asking themselves serious questions.

This isn’t an issue of ‘honesty’ it is one of professionalism. Did they really sit back, look at the game and compare it to the hype, pre-release statements and repeated promises from the developer?

If they had done that then every single one of them would have found grounds to, at the very, very least, mention that the ending might not tick all the boxes that Bioware claimed it would.

However that wouldn’t earn them much from their employers, not because of some sort of nepotism, but because detailed reviews take time to prepare and in that time the competition has already released their “review” and you’ve just lost X% of your potential readership!

Gamers demanding “in-depth” reviews by reviewers, without any time for those reviewers to conduct a proper review (and, fcol, finishing the flipping game!) are as much to blame as the reviewers who happily submit their reviews without even getting to the end of the game.

Make a list of the most prominent gaming magazines whose reviewers even mentioned some questions over the ending, then ask yourself why the percentage of those does not match the percentage of fans displeased by the same.